Monthly Archives: January 2012

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Friday

Not only is Friday scone day at work, it’s also when we finish classes earlier than the other days of the week.  Sometimes I stay on late to catch up on marking and paperwork or to tidy up the midden that is my desk; other times I head home shortly after the bell rings.

Today was the first still, sunny day we’ve had in these parts for weeks and weeks and weeks and…  Well, you get the idea.

No prizes for guessing what I did when the bell rang today.

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Cheese Scones

Friday at school is scone day.

Two of our best bakers (and we have quite a few) get up early in the morning and bake a couple of batches each. Just before 9am, they carry them carefully into school in big Tuperware boxes, watched from windows all the while.  Once securely in the staffroom, the cakes are then slathered with a generous helping of jam and cream and laid out ready for morning break.

The interval bell rings.  Classroom doors burst open and today, it’s teachers rather than pupils who are first out the doors and charging through the halls.   For a few short minutes it’s every educator for themselves.  Manners are forgotten as everyone tries to get to the staffroom in time to claim a scone.

I’d like to claim I was more mannerly than the masses but the day I saw the chemistry teacher take not the last scone but the last two scones and then devour them both right in front of my face still brings a tear to my eye.

I love scone day.

Here at home, I sometimes make my own scones but they are the savoury kind for eating with big bowls of vegetable soup rather than the sweet variety.  They haven’t caused any stampedes as of yet but they are pretty damned good. :)

Cheese Scones

(makes 8-10)

225g self raising flour (if you live somewhere that doesn’t have SR flour or are a bit sniffy about it see this page for flour/baking powder equivalents)

1 tspn baking powder

Pinch of pepper

40g salted butter, cut into cubes

50g mature cheddar (plus a little extra), grated

125ml milk

1 tspn English mustard

  • Sift the flour, baking powder and pepper into a bowl.
  • Add the butter and use your fingertips to rub it into the flour until a breadcrumb like texture is achieved.
  • Stir through the cheese.
  • Mix the mustard and milk together well.  Add little by little to the bowl and stir with a spoon until a dough is formed.  It shouldn’t be too sticky.
  • Roll out until 2cm thick.   Use a pastry cutter to cut out rounds of dough and place on a baking tray.  Brush with a little egg or milk and sprinkle over some more cheese.
  • Bake in a 200 oC oven (I have a fan oven – increase the heat a bit for non-fan) for 15 minutes.
  • Cool slightly before eating.